Martin Wegmann

remote sensing in ecology & conservation

About

Martin is based at the remote sensing department of Prof. S. Dech, head of DLR-DFD (German Aerospace Data Center) in Würzburg where he leads the Remote Sensing and Biodiversity research topic. Moreover he is an assistant professor at the Global Change Ecology M.Sc. Program and the point of contact for the CEOS Biodiversity initiative, which aims at coordinating space borne activities for biodiversity and conservation related activities. Moreover he is on the steering committee of the Conservation Remote Sensing group, advisory board of the EU BON project and Implementation Committee in GEO BON.

In his courses the theoretical background as well as the practical implementation of remote sensing for biodiversity research and conservation application are covered. The remote sensing data analysis as well as the integration with biodiversity data and the spatial statistics including spatial modelling are mainly done with OpenSource software such as R and GRASS. Some courses are also taught within the Global Change Ecology MSc. program as well as in different locations in Africa and South-East Asia. Additionally he is founding member of the AniMove.org training activity aiming at combining remote sensing with animal movement data, as well as the EcoSens.org training, that aims to teach ecologists and conservationists to appyl remote sensing in their daily work.

The added value of spatial and temporal variable environmental data sets for corresponding biodiversity modelling approaches are in the focus of his work. Especially the spatial arrangement of landcover and its implication for spatial biodiversity patterns based on remotely sensed information interests him. Most of his work has been done in Europe and Africa.

He is editor of the Remote Sensing in Ecology and Conservation journal, more details on his activties can be found on the remote-sensing.eu webpage as well as on researchgate.

This is a book about how ecologists can integrate remote sensing and GIS in their daily work. It will allow ecologists to get started with the application of remote sensing and to understand its potential and limitations. Using practical examples, the book covers all necessary steps from planning field campaigns to deriving ecologically relevant information through remote sensing and modelling of species distributions.

This books explains how to apply remote sensing and GIS to ecological research projects. It will provide practical examples covering each step, from planning through to remote sensing and modelling. Only Open Source software will be used for the examples such as R and QGIS.

various M.Sc. topics for your thesis are possible and can be discussed in person. Please look also through past M.Sc. thesis in the next tab to get a better idea.

Biodiversity analysis and conservation decision relies on adequate and meaningful data that are available on a long-term and global basis. Such environmental information need adequate spatial and temporal resolution and remote sensing data does provide a wide range of potentially suitable data sets. Various approaches concerning remote sensing data use for biodiversity and conservation exist to improve the application and integration. This is especially important since the use of remote sensing has increased widely over the past decades, and therefore interdisciplinary approaches foster the understanding of needed parameters for biodiversity monitoring, which provide guidance to observation systems as to what and how to measure key aspects of biodiversity. Multi-scale, multi-sensor and multi-temporal remote sensing data analysis do provide needed and crucial information for ecological analysis, especially within conservation applications, species distribution analysis or animal movement analysis. A variety of MSc topics is available aiming to improve remote sensing usage in ecology conservation, as well as its application. It is aimed at, that all MSc are in close collaboration with ecology or conservation organizations to support a truly interdisciplinary thesis. Martin Wegmann is dedicated to use his scientific network to organizations such as SCBI, ZSL, IUCN, UNEP-WCMC, WWF etc. for embedding EAGLE MSc thesis.

For more details, please see the tab of past MSc topics. Moreover, please visit www.remote-sensing-biodiversity.org for updates on data, events and publications related to remote sensing data analysis in ecology and conservation. Additionally, AniMove.org and EcoSens.org offer further details on potential MSc topics and trainings.

list of recent graduates and their topics, mainly done in collaboration with colleagues listed under the “network” tab:

Andres Hess:
“Deforestation in Myanmar – what can we say about causes?”

Christian Wohlfart:
“Mapping tropical dry forest in South East Asia using a continuous cover approach.”

Andrea Früh:
“Historic changes in regional ecosystem service demand.”

Wanda Graf:
“Suitability of Light detection and ranging (LiDAR) data and texture measures of aerial images to model the species distribution of Glaucidium passerinum (Pygmy Owl) in Vercors, French Alps”

Martin Wegmann is involved in various professional trainings (summer/science schools) focusing on remote sensing applications for ecology and conservation. The following activities are founded by him and colleagues: